Codexis Expands and Strengthens its Leadership Team with Two Executive Hires
05/05/2020 - 07:00 AM
REDWOOD CITY, Calif., May 05, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Codexis, Inc., a leading protein engineering company and developer of novel biotherapeutics, announces the appointment of Stefan Lutz, Ph.D. as Senior Vice President, Research and Karl A. Schoene, Ph.D. as Senior Vice President, Development & Operations, effective immediately. Both positions are newly created and both report to Codexis President and CEO John Nicols.
“We are fortunate to welcome two extraordinary professionals to lead functions that are critical to future growth in both our Performance Enzymes and our Novel Biotherapeutics business segments,” stated Mr. Nicols. “Stefan and Karl will serve as key members of our leadership team, and we look forward to their many contributions as we expand and grow our business.
“Stefan brings unprecedented knowledge in protein engineering and synthetic biology, which are at the core of our R&D activities. He and his accomplishments are well-known and highly regarded within our industry and by many of our scientists at Codexis. After years in academia and as a consultant, he has a keen interest in applying his knowledge full time in a commercial setting. His drive and expertise make him ideally qualified to lead our research team, which represents over half of our employees, and to advance the discovery of proteins that are the engine for our product growth and business expansion,” he said.
“Karl has proven success in leading dynamic, multi-functional teams and growing numerous global specialty chemical platform businesses in a wide variety of settings over his substantial career,” said Mr. Nicols. “This broad-based experience will be highly valuable in developing, scaling and commercializing Codexis’ growing suite of products discovered in small scale under our CodeEvolver® process. Karl also brings a wealth of commercial stage expertise beneficial to optimizing and leading the global manufacturing and supply chain operations that continue to build as the company grows.”
Dr. Lutz most recently was a Professor and Chair of the Chemistry Department at Emory University, having joined the university in 2002 and ascending to Chemistry Department Chair in 2014. In addition to his academic work, over the past six years, he has consulted with AgriMetis, a technology company focused on integrating biology, biochemistry and chemistry for the development of sustainable crop protection solutions. He previously served on the scientific advisory boards of ZuvaChem, an industrial biotechnology company, CODA Genomics Inc., a firm using biology and advanced computational algorithms to design and synthesize novel, high-diversity gene libraries for engineering proteins, and SynBioX Inc., an innovative synthetic biology company he co-founded. Dr. Lutz has co-authored more than 65 articles published in peer-reviewed journals and six technical books and journals. He holds six patents and is a frequent lecturer and speaker.
Dr. Lutz received a B.Sc. in chemistry/chemical engineering from the Zurich University of Applied Sciences, an M.Sc. in Biotechnology from the University of Teesside and a Ph.D. in chemistry from the University of Florida. He was a postdoctoral fellow at Pennsylvania State University.
Dr. Schoene most recently served as President, CEO and Director of Elevance Renewable Sciences, positions he held for four years after first serving as Chief Technology Officer. During his tenure, he led the rapid development of high-performing, environmentally friendly specialty chemical products, managed international joint ventures and oversaw product manufacturing using the company’s proprietary technology. Before that, he served for three years as President, CEO and Director of Accutest Holding Inc., a network of environmental testing laboratories. At Accutest he led a performance turnaround that resulted in the sale of the company to SGS Group. Earlier, Dr. Schoene served for four years as President, CEO and COO of the R&D-driven technology company InEnTec LLC and for eight years in positions of increasing responsibility at the multinational specialty chemical company AkzoNobel. Since 2013, Dr. Schoene has served as Chairman of Ionic Solutions LLC, a firm he founded to advise businesses in the medical, pharmaceutical, chemical, energy and adjacent industries.
Dr. Schoene holds a B.S. in chemistry and a Ph.D. in physical chemistry from the University of Virginia, where he was also appointed to the faculty as an instructor of physical chemistry.
About Codexis, Inc. ® protein engineering technology to develop proteins for a variety of applications, including enzymes as biotherapeutics, as biocatalysts for the commercial manufacture of pharmaceuticals and fine chemicals, industrial enzymes, and for use in molecular diagnostics. For its Biotherapeutics pipeline, Codexis’ technology enables improvements in protein efficacy, through enhancement of activity, affinity, stability, as well as uptake by target cells. For more information, see www.codexis.com .
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